


I'm sorry, but...

by marcoftmario



Category: Football RPF
Genre: F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-30
Updated: 2015-07-30
Packaged: 2018-04-12 03:36:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,866
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4463963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/marcoftmario/pseuds/marcoftmario
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Leo is done with people after all they said. Neymar is there to help him and, if Leo wants, to do something else.<br/>Leo wants, but he can't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'm sorry, but...

**Author's Note:**

> English is not my first language and this is the first thing I have ever written so I am sorry for the mistakes, correct me when I get wrong.  
> I love Lionel Messi, and I saw him so sad after the final that I thought Neymar could help...  
> anyway this doesn't make any sense, and it's a bit late and it's shit. sorry.

Endless. Endless was what he was feeling, that pain on the chest that, it didn’t matter what he did, it just wouldn’t go away.

_You didn’t win anything. Pecho frío. Go! Who the hell do you think you are? Go to Spain. Please, Leo, go. It doesn’t matter, Lionel, we forgive you. Pecho frío. Pecho frío._

Endless was the injustice. Endless were the people who spoke without knowing, without wanting to know. Endless, too, were the people who spoke in his defense. Nothing, never, would be enough to make him stop feeling like that, depressed, wanting to disappear, to be anyone else. He had only asked to play football.

Once, he had read “Neymar is the Justin Bieber of football”. Once, a long time ago, he had laughed. What was he going to know about Neymar? What did he know about his history, his effort to be better and to ignore the press and the people that only insulted him? And, most important, what did he know about him _right now?_ “I always end up doing something to make them hate me” he had told Leo once, one of those days when he felt sincere and wanted to let all the hate that always fell on him flow, and tell someone all the things he was feeling. And Leo had been there, listening. Leo was always there. Yes, it was true what he was saying; little details, on and off the pitch, were only taken in count if it was him what they were about.

But Neymar was something else: always getting used to it, avoiding it, putting a smile (or, failing that, a couple of glasses with alcohol in them). Neymar didn’t have to carry on his shoulders a good team playing bad. Neither Lucas Biglia, neither the journalists who defended him, not even Mascherano (how would they blame Masche? No one ever thought about blaming on Javier, or Pastore. Not when they proved and were still proving all those things, more important than scoring) had to. He needed to be alone and not to see anyone for days or, at least, not to speak about football or the two finals. Who the hell cared about who was the best in the world? Not even the Portuguese, the message that Leo had received attested it.

He wanted to be back in January, February, March, or 2014 at the end of the year. He jumped to the pitch and he saw, he knew what Neymar was going to do. He did not even needed to lift his head to see at what specific little space their rivals had forgotten to cover the Brazilian was going to run at, to receive the perfect pass and return him the favor, helping him to define and score. Or maybe it was just on the contrary, the perfect pass being given by Messi, and the _golazo_ was scored by Neymar. Who cared? They didn’t. They were invincible, unbeatable, unbelievable.

Until they lost a match, and one became two, and they were back to the same. Was it Messi’s fault, because he had scored three goals last weekend? Was the defense, that ten days ago they praised, the problem? They had this obsession to blame on someone that they forgot that it had to be the other team’s fault, because _they_ had done the effort to win. Because you can’t be invincible every day, at some point you’ll have to get the guard down and not win. It can happen.

Even the best in the world can make mistakes. He had heard that obvious phrase that people couldn't understand so many times, that it made him angry. He didn’t even know why. Those days everything made him angry.

 

Crying after the final had been purifying, but it had not served for anything else. Bah, yes, it did, now he had the 90 % of the integrants from _la Selección_ calling him every day to check he wasn’t committing suicide yet. Neymar, nothing. He had gone to Rosario to vacation without wanting to do it.  In the mornings he woke up, Thiago and Antonella went for a little walk and he spent the day between hours that escaped from him, and going often to the gym. Occasionally, his (or her) parents went to the house and cooked something, talked with them, they did like everything was okay and they were his favorite persons to talk, because he smiled, in a fake way but he did, and it was like the finals and the hate never existed. He was so thankful about it.

The only conversation that actually was helpful for him had been one with Javier Pastore, one in which he had told him flatly to stop fooling around, to ignore them all, that he didn’t deserve any of that. He said that if he wanted to be angry, it had to be for another final that was lost, but not for all those idiots. Leo had the words on the tip of the tongue, “who do you think you are? You don’t know me”, but when he was about to do it, he was stopped by Javier speaking again, and him thinking that, after all, he didn’t say it because he knew that the other was right. And Javier _did_ know him. For him, he wasn’t Messi the best player in the world; he knew how to see the people from another point of view, from the right point of view. He had felt good when Neymar looked at him with all that admiration, an admiration that didn’t decrease at all with the time, that one people has, of someone who recognizes someone as an idol, later as a friend but never stopping seeing him as what he is, but in that moment he felt relieved because that didn’t happen in the national team.

Anyway, that didn’t matter because he got the call at 3:43 am. The number was very long, surely from another country, and in general he didn’t answer to that calls (he had already had enough creepy experiences, thank you) but he was half asleep, and didn’t care about who was calling him, honestly.

“Leo!” said ( _screamed_ ) a voice that he knew very well. “It’s Neymar!” as if he had not realized. As if he could not recognize his voice between thirty.

“What the fuck are you doing calling me at this hour, _boludo?_ ” he put on his feet as if he had been kicked and saw that his girlfriend was now awake. He didn’t pay attention and went directly to the kitchen, the only place he could think of to be calm.

“I wanted to know if you were still crying in the corners and suffering because of the cup and the critics” it was obvious that he was Brazilian. He spoke Spanish more fluent than when he had arrived to the Barcelona, when he was more much younger, immature, and when Leo didn’t care if Ney spent half a training speaking to him; but the accent, the mixed words in Brazilian when they were alike, were always going to be there while he spoke. Leo, with time, had learned to be patient enough to not be that bothered about it. His voice, right now, sounded like he had to be heard through the background noise, and it was very distant than how he normally was. He also slurred, as if he was cold… or drunk. And Leo wanted to think he knew Neymar enough to know which one of those two was real, and to be irritated by the comment, the tone of voice, the hour.

“Oh come on, stop it because you don’t know what you are saying. You don’t have an idea of what you are saying” he said, loud, almost screaming, without being able to control what he was saying because it was an injury so recent that he hated to remember it. He hated people making him remember.

“ _Você pensa que eu não sei?_ Do you think I don’t know? Lionel, it is obvious that you never took your time to stop and think about other people’s situation. Idiot.”

And he hung up. The insult and that was it. Leo raised an eyebrow, trying not to think on the other person’s words and getting all his Argentinean side by thinking “at what moment did I was friends with someone like that? When did I get along with a Brazilian?” although he had Brazilian friends and wasn’t racist at all. He asked himself that very often, without bad blood, sadness, maybe with a smile and looking at him while speaking lively with him about any theme, about any goal or match just played, or even when they played. He still didn’t understand. ‘I’ll see him at Spain’, he tried to think, while he got back to his bed and told his girlfriend that it had only been Kun wanting to annoy him. Why tell her that it was Neymar wanting to bother him, making him angry, and insulting him, drunk? He tried not to feel bad again, because it had reached the point where what Neymar said mattered more than he wanted.

He slept normally the rest of the night and when he woke up he was the one who took care of Thiago all the morning while his girlfriend was sleeping. He felt adoration for that kid, and he had not demonstrated it to him in the last time, being too busy feeling regret and hating himself and the critics. As soon as she woke up, they (the three, together) got finally out of the house for a walk, in those streets of Rosario they knew at that hour would be less transited and with less people, when they could be more relaxed (even tough, being Messi, they were never _that_ far from all the fans, from the people, as they would like to be on those days to rest) and it wasn’t a good start of the day after all. Bah, no, it was just bad in compare with all the others he had had before. Or the ones he had spent with Kun in the cup. Or the ones before, in Germany, before and after the Champions League final. In the last times, he could not remember any morning where he was plenty happy with Antonella. But they didn’t talk about it.

They came back to their house, sick of all the people. He leaned down on the couch to watch TV next to his son (paying more attention to his son than to the TV while the younger did the exact opposite, of course) as his girlfriend offered to cook something for lunch. To be in his situation, he smiled more than what he expected. He even had that same smile he had when Thiago said something with his little voice still confusing how to pronounce some words and being the cutest, beautiful and adorable person in the whole world to him, when he called again. This time he did recognize the number and he only answered because, honestly, he thought he would have an apologize. Maybe he was too used to people doing that to him, because he couldn’t have been more wrong.

 

“…hello.”

“Hi! I called you last night, right?”

“Well…”

“Never mind, don’t answer that. I recorded the call on my phone by mistake.”

“Oh…”

“Yes, it has an option where you can... sorry I don’t want to bother you much longer…”

“No, it’s ok.”

“But there was one thing I did not understand very well and I would like to talk to you about it. Did you say that I didn’t know what I was talking about?”

“I said it because you looked very drunk.”

“Do you think I don’t know what is like to be whistled? And the people screaming “clown” everywhere you see? Being pushed by my rivals, being kicked at every match because they hate me? I am insulted every week. They insult me and they don’t care.”

“That’s not the same, Ney.”

“What is the difference, then?”

“…”

“But do you think I care about all that? Lio, there was always people who hated you, who criticized you. You are Lionel Messi. I know all that doesn’t have to be with what you are, but some people in your country- well, almost all your country, are demanding you like you are a machine who can’t have a bad day, and you still have to vomit before every match! You don’t have to give a damn about all that, because have you ever see me suffering for all that? If you will be depressed, let that be because of Higuaín, but not for the people who know nothing… oh, fuck, I called you to fight and ended up consoling you.”

“Thank you, ugly Brazilian. I know you love watching me vomit.”

“Ha. They once called me “the Justin Bieber of football”.”

“…are you laughing or crying?”

“I’m laughing, of course! People are silly, but you are more, so laugh about yourself too or you will be an asshole, basically.”

“Thank you. Seriously, I appreciate it. You always put me in a good mood, _pibe_.”

“You are welcome. I do it because I love you, old man.”

“Uh, it would be so good if you were here hugging me.”

“Well, well. It’s only a couple of days before we see each other. Do not suffer that much without me.”

“Calm down, here with my family everything is perfect… Ney?”

“Eh, yes, here I am. I have to go. Talk to you later, okay?”

“Yes! Send you a hug, handsome.”

 

“No, no, I swear. Forgive me, please!” her voice was desperate, maddening, but yet in a low voice. Antonella wanted to cry and she couldn’t permit herself that, because she was trying not to screw up things more than she had already. But Leo had the suitcase in his hand, was giving a kiss and a hug to his son, because he was going to miss him and, it didn’t matter if it was less than a week, he wasn’t going to be that asshole to not to say goodbye before going to Spain.

With Antonella, things were different. Being ignored by the best player in the world, the boyfriend of his childhood, the father of this son and the one that was coming, made her cry a little bit. Leo continued ignoring her words, but his eyes were almost screaming. “Don’t try to fix it. There was even a video, which you made, by the way.” With the thumb, softly, he took the tears off her cheeks and her cheekbones, and the kiss he gave her was obviously to make the rest of the people in the airport think that it all was normal, not weird. “Thank you for letting me these days in Spain. When you arrive, we speak more relaxed.”

He seemed relaxed, anyway. He wasn’t doing that of holding, pressing, playing with his hand because he was nervous or felt anxiety about something, thing that he normally did, and he didn’t refuse to a look in the eyes. He didn’t speak too loud or too low, and his expression wasn’t extremely serious but he didn’t smile. He was neutral, calmed in front of the people, as he had learned to do with the time and a lot of effort due to his natural personality, shy, introverted and very inclined to getting intimidate (on the contrary than when he was on the pitch). He got on the plane (the one they got for him) after a short wait, because everyone was waiting for him. He still couldn’t get used to it, or accept it, but having so many hours of flight to face, he was thankful.

The time rounded 9.00 pm in Buenos Aires when he started flying. He had 12 or 13 hours until arriving (“it depends on how everything works” they had told him) and he would be at Barcelona after the midday, so he could be at training with his teammates who were back from EEUU and Neymar at the other day, having all the afternoon to arrive and try to arrange everything at his house.

But before thinking about Spain, it was the flight. He was getting more bored than what he had thought. The options of movies to see were terrible, he wasn’t hungry and he couldn’t find another entertainment than playing some shitty game and talk with the people he always talked on Whatsapp who had nothing to tell him. He was just in the middle of one of those games of questions and answers (one of these whose questions were so difficult that he wanted to throw the mobile by the airs, because they had no sense at all and didn’t entertained) when _that_ one came.

“ _Oi!_ ” 11:03 pm.

He had been checking old conversations with Neymar that day; he was not going to lie. Specifically the last they had had. It had been before the cup; in that one, they wished luck to each other and to each other’s teams. At the end, none of them had been so lucky after all. Leo didn’t think about it. He answered.

 “ _Finally someone who’s talk worth! This fly is so boring”_ 11:04 pm.

 “ _That’s flattering! Thanks!”_ 11:07  
_“I’m in a flight too! I want to be there right noooow”_ 11:07 pm.

 “ _I didn’t know the movies in here were so bad”_ 11:07 pm.

 “ _You don’t choose what you want to see?”_ 11:07 pm.

 “ _Yep, but theyre ALL bad”_ 11:08 pm.

_“Uh, bad luck” 11:08 pm.  
“Well, tell me something. Talk to me!” 11:09_

_Leo is writing. On line. Writing. On line. Writing._

_“Antonella recorded a video of her almost fucking with a Chilean while we were at the cup and I saw it on her phone” 11:11_ pm.

_Neymar is calling you from Whatsapp._

 

Lio didn’t expect a call. He was expecting everything else except having to talk. That’s why he left a seconds pass until he answered, because he wasn’t expecting it and because he didn’t know at what exact moment he had decided to tell Neymar about Antonella and the video on whatsapp, or when he had actually done that.

“…hello.”

“Wait… why _almost_ fucking?”

The Argentinean doubted again, but it wasn’t long. He just remembered that it was Neymar who he was talking to, and there he spoke. “Because she’s pregnant.”

“No!” the Brazilian’s voice sounded far but there wasn’t more background noise than a distant music that seemed from an action movie, that at some point was turned off. Leo supposed that his phone was at loud-speaker, so he decided to do the same thing: he reclined the comfortable seat that was almost a bed, if we talk about the size, everything he could and rested his arm and the phone at one side. He did everything possible to avoid the nausea and headache he had when he thought about his girlfriend doing that to him.

So he thought about Neymar. More than thinking about him, he focused on what he said, closed his eyes and imagined him saying what he was saying now, just like he was. “Did you talk to her? I mean, that should be important.”

“I saw it a couple of days ago. Since then we didn’t have a serious conversation… bah, except for the one when I asked her if she could stay in Rosario some days while I was in Spain. It will be just for a week or so.”

He needed to talk to someone, him now, and now Neymar was the one who was there for him. “Why? Are you alone now?”

“I asked her because I wanted some days alone. But only for a few days, to calm down and talk to her quietly when she goes. We are having two children together… I don’t want to screw it up. It was hard for her, but she said yes.”

“Is Thiago in Rosario?”

“Yes.”

“…people will talk, you know that, don’t you?” he had expected that, the comment and the situation he was establishing. He didn’t care.

“People already spoke, and I’m alive.”

“That’s how I like you to think!” the happiness the boy showed was incredible and incredibly contagious too. Leo was thankful about it. “Then, if you are alone, I can go to your place or something when I arrive. I am alone too” he said, and he laughed.

“I know.”

The conversation went through a lot of variants. How La Liga would be that year, the incorporations, Lucho (as Neymar said), the Champions League, what hour they would be at Spain and what they would do. They even talked about the Libertadores. It was always like that with Neymar.

When Leo’s phone said that it was thirty past twelve of the night, they went to sleep. Both on their own, but feeling closer than ever.

-

It was so weird to arrive alone to Spain. Making all the stupidities of the plane on the airport so he could be out of there was different without his teammates or his friends, or his family, and he was just realizing about that when he had no company. It wasn’t that hard though, it was just boring. He didn’t even know how he was going to manage to go to his house; his car was parked there, and he was thinking that he didn’t know anyone to call and get it because he also had the key while he finally put the feet on the floor to be out of the relatively small airplane he was in. He thought about asking someone on the airport for a taxi, he knew they could call one, and he was ready with his suitcase disposed to do it when he managed to see that someone (a guy) with a cap and glasses under which you could see a smile was waving at him from a twenty meter distance. He guessed it was a fan and decided just to smile at him and ignore him until Leo, weirdly because of the distance but he could do it, saw the tattoo on the neck: “Tudo Passa” and he got closer to the Brazilian not believing what he was seeing. The other man wouldn’t let him even hug him for a second, because he grabbed him from the arm and took him outside, to a parking he didn’t know and surely the rest of the people neither, because there wasn’t a lot of cars there. He knew why the other had done it, and he wouldn’t have thought it was that bad if he would have said something instead of practically dragging him out there without saying a thing. The conversation started only when Neymar made sure there was nobody around.

“I arrived home a couple of hours ago and I remembered that you were arriving here at this hour so I came. It took me like twenty minutes to convince the guy who attended me to leave me park the car here and knowing where you were going to be when you arrived and then I waited for you and surprisingly nobody saw me… hello!” he dropped it all at once while he took off the alarm of his car, and Leo listened to him unable to avoid one of those smiles of “I can’t believe what I’m listening, you were so bored!”, but in the deep of his mind he knows that the Brazilian isn’t there only because he was bored, it was something else. When he realized Leo wasn’t going to say anything, he spoke again. “Do you have your car in here or shall I take you home?”

“Er, no, I don’t have my car, but I was going to go in a taxi, no problem.”

“Oh, come on” he opened the door of the trunk and, without asking, he put the suitcase of the older in there. He looked at him while closing it, he stayed a couple of seconds in the nothingness, trying to see what his face said, his eyes, and he got closer to hug him. His hugs were both so intense and familiar, known, without the fear that it would be too strong (well, Leo _was_ a little afraid, because every time he hugged him he felt like if he did it too strong Neymar would break in his arms, it didn’t matter if they had the same strength and Leo was the shorter).

“I missed you, boy” he said, and yes, Neymar had missed him too, more than he had expected. His Brazil, his beloved Brazil, hadn’t been that repairer as he had thought, as had been all his life. He had problems with his friends from there and that changed completely the panorama. Leo always made him forget everything bad, unconsciously, without even need to tell him anything.

When they got into the car they started to talk about the weather. It was such a trivial conversation, the one that Neymar was an expert in and Leo couldn’t stand. How the weather in Rosario was, how was it in Brazil and the difference with Spain, with the hot weather that there was in there. It wasn’t very last, like every trivial conversation, but the silence wasn’t bad as well. Leo was used to it, more than Neymar, because this one loved to talk, but it wasn’t that bad for both of them. The Argentinean, for the first time since the last time he played a match, couldn’t stop smiling and thinking that he didn’t know that Neymar thought about him that much. “You are crazy, you know.”

“I just remembered that you told me you were going to be alone and ten minutes after arriving at my home I was already bored. So I came here… in other things, to talk seriously.” Neymar was so sure when he spoke about everything that denying something to him was almost impossible for Leo.

“About what?” the tone of voice in which they were heading the conversation was rather normal, cordial, sympathetic like them, but there was some seriousness that was only when the words were said, in that way they were speaking.

“About the Copa América.”

There wasn’t any more words until they arrived to Leo’s house (a road that Neymar knew almost by heart), where the things started to change a little bit. From fractions, the Brazilian, like attracted by something (by him, maybe) was getting closer and closer to Leo in that silent conversation between _mate_ and _mate_ that they usually did. He felt back in those days after trainings, when they were distended (maybe too much, you could say) and couldn’t stop talking for a second, those eternal days when they were (and did) anything, everything. So concentrated  he was, and so much he was thinking, that he only remembered the suitcase minutes after being talking, already inside the house. He went quickly do drop it to his room, and tried not to take so much time doing it because Neymar was waiting for him.

He went back in a few minutes, because he only took a couple of things off the suitcase and the bag (things like food and dirty clothes) and because he hurried up. After going to the bathroom, he came back to the [homeroom] of his house and saw through the large window that was practically all the wall that there was a sun shining out there, he saw Neymar taking off the shelter he had in, and felt how hot it was the atmosphere, when he had the idea that made the _serious conversation_ begin. But it wasn’t exactly about the Copa América.

“Do you want to go outside?” he didn’t need an answer. A nod was all he had and the Brazilian stood on his feet while the other pronounced the phrase and, accompanied with a grin that said that what he had suggested was exactly what he was thinking. He began to walk slowly to the door, waiting for the other to do it too, to follow him, and Leo obviously did. He passed behind him and when he reached outside, the grass, he lied down on the floor. He was expecting Neymar to lie next to him but what he didn’t expect was he leaning his head on the elder’s chest, looking at the sky free of clouds of Spain. And the real conversation _really_ came.

“Did you want us to talk seriously?”

“Yes.”

“Well, the thing is that I don’t know if I want to talk about the Copa América.”

“…and what do you want to talk about instead?”

“Anything you want.”

“Let’s talk about me and you.”

“Do you think there’s anything about us to talk?”

“When I first came here I thought you were going to hate me, to be honest.”

“Why?”

“Because… a lot of people do.”

While Leo spoke, asked, the conversation flowed. The only thing that was missing to be completely relaxed would be the river to his side, emitting that endless sound of water running, but they didn’t need that because they were _so_ calmed, so relaxed, that they were happy with it. They were happy with an empty pool at some distance (that of course they wouldn’t use), Neymar was happy with listening and feeling the breathing of Leo and how his body moved, reacted to pronouncing the words that at that point didn’t matter much and helped to make him say what he was saying in a lower tone because he knew the other could hear him perfectly even muttering, and Leo was happy  with feeling the form of the head of Neymar, the hair, maybe touching it, until he heard the last thing he said. He raised his head tensing every muscle on his torso and looking at him. He realized that the other one had his eyes shut and was seeking for his hand to hold it.

“But I would not hate you. I-I couldn’t.”

He didn’t try to deny what the younger had said. He couldn’t believe him while he said people hated him, but certainly he wasn’t completely respected by his rivals. He had reached a point while he didn’t even deny it to him because he had no chance to make him realize of that.

“Yeah, well, I know. Now I know.”

He suddenly had a thought. Because of everything Neymar was doing, because of what he was saying, for _those_ little details. It seemed stupid to him, because _why would he do that_ , but he thought that it wouldn’t be bad for both of them if it wasn’t stupid, and it would only help him to get the doubt out of there and make Neymar remember, or take conscience, about something he believed that it was going out of his hands because of what he had been doing, and if he kept going like that he would have ended up making everybody, specially Antonella and maybe Ney, hate him. He had to stop at that exact moment, that of playing the boyfriends, the “friends with rights”. It was principally because he didn’t feel attracted by the Brazilian. No. _No, I don’t feel attracted by him,_ he repeated to himself to convince.

“Ney, you know that, despite everything that has been happening these days, I still being with Antonella and have a son with her, let’s not say that there is one more coming.”

It took a long time before the answer was said, probably because the youngest thought there was going to be more than that, not because he didn’t listen. He also had a child and had been with someone, yes, but he was still too young to know how hard was to put in risk the stability of a family. He still believed those “cute” details of “I thought about you and came to drive you home” or the “I would never hate you” would stay only in it if they continued, and Leo knew that it was probably not going to work like that. He knew they had to be friends and nothing else, not by their decision (although it was in part) but for the context. They couldn’t.

“Yes. Of course I know. Why?” his voice was normal again. The calm (or at least a part of it, because obviously he had released his hand while the other one leaved his hair alone and his head leaning on the chest of the Argentinean had passed from relaxing to uncomfortable) seemed to be back, even if it was just a shadow of what had been.

“No, for nothing, it just wanted to leave that thing clear.” His own words hurt. He knew that Neymar had understood exactly what he meant, but he didn’t want the things to keep like that from that moment, that’s why he talked. Again. “You have plans for tonight? We can cook something, or something.” Damn. He couldn’t even speak. _Cook something or something?_ _Wow, you are the king of the words; I can’t believe you are not giving classes of English to stupid kids,_ he said to himself, maybe too hard but actually meaning it.

“No, actually… eh, tonight is coming Davi Lucca’s mom to leave him at my house, because she’s here and tomorrow early he comes back to Brazil so I’ll have to be there if I don’t want any trouble with her.”

Leo couldn’t blame him. Seriously, he couldn’t; the number of parties he had had to cancel because of Antonella or Thiago had been a lot (except, obviously, the parties when they had win La Liga, the Copa Del Rey and, of course, the Champions League!) and… he just didn’t blame him. But it was so nice to be like that, looking at the sky that at that moment had a cloud already, with the sun of the afternoon hitting him on the face sometimes so much that you had to close your eyes but when you did it, it wasn’t that annoying because you could see with the rest of your senses. The shadow up them was because of the house that wasn’t that far from where they were but it seemed like miles away because of the peace that there was in there. Barcelona was taking a break, and only Leo and Neymar were there to notice the silence. Silence.

“I think I should be going. It’s a bit late and I have to clean up the house or they will kill me.” Leo didn’t avoid him. Leo didn’t say anything. He didn’t even ask who “they” were. Neymar was normal but generally he wouldn’t go that way, that fast, that…

 _Do you want me to go with y…_ no. He wouldn’t say anything. They would see each other next day, at training, and they would kept seeing, and again, because their thing wouldn’t end that fast and easy, it wouldn’t matter how many Antonellas were in the middle. They would just be friends, and that would be the change.

And Neymar left, with the kiss on his cheek they always gave as greeting (well, maybe not-so-friends) with the excuse that in Argentina they greeted like that but he didn’t do it with none of his friends (except maybe Javier, he was always Argentinean).

Every time Neymar left someone’s house, he sent a text. Anything, from a “:)” to something very deep that would make you smile all night or get really angry. He always did it. Leo had supposed that he had too much credit on the phone and he didn’t know how to spend it, buy the Brazilian had said once that it had surged thanking to Davi’s mum and that it was like he felt like he had to do it when he leaved her house, but that quickly he had adopted it with every person he cared about. He had never told him the real reason, but he had done it with him since the first time he went to his house. And it had never stopped.

But that day there was nothing. He spent a good twenty minutes with the phone on his hand, waiting, but nothing. No message from Ney.

But it was ok. He had let him know, indirectly but he had done, that he was with Antonella and that it didn’t had to change, and what was he expecting now? Receive a text from him saying “I love you”? He needed to calm down.

 

Eventually, he calmed. He cooked something and sat down to eat the first dinner completely alone on his home in a lot of time, so much that he didn’t even remembered. It wasn’t that bad: he watched the Spanish TV he was used to and went to sleep early. He hadn’t done much in the day, but when he had training he didn’t even needed to take a pill to sleep. It was like his mind at the instant knew that he had to do and calmed down. Because he took football that serious. Because he founded happiness on going to training, even if he had to wake up at 6/7 in the morning and doing those exhausting and boring travels.

But we don’t care about what he ate (even though Leo did, because he didn’t eat anything out of the strict diet), because the important thing happened at night, later. Because while he looked at the hour on his phone and saw he had time to stay a bit doing stupidities (or thinking), he realized two things: he was in love with Antonella as much as he was with Neymar and he could never be what he wanted to be with the Brazilian.

I don’t know if I should first underline and explain the two mentioned things, because the chain of thoughts that ended into that fatidic but lightening conclusions was pretty weird, or if he should remark first that he only felt relieve when he realized. Because Leo had an order to everything: first the family, after the very close friends, then his teammates (that, after all that time, he could say they were his closer friends) and _then_ the rest of the people. There wasn’t any “Neymar” in there, he needed to be put somewhere, give him some kind of reference of what he had to do to agree with Leo. The family was his cousins, his parents, his sons… and Antonella. Even though he wanted, it couldn’t be “Antonella and his friend-with-rights that from time to time he kisses and that he constantly is with”. However, he knew he was Neymar’s crush, and he thought it was something reciprocal that with the time kept advancing at the same rhythm. What he didn’t expected to realize of was that he missed Antonella instead (or at the same time) than Neymar. He missed her warm touch, her presence never invisible, and her half-asleep comments at 4 am. Maybe it was because with him that had never happened, but that was just as familiar as the shine on the eyes of the Brazilian when he looked at Leo. Conclusion: he loved them both but with Antonella there was history and children. And the social approbation. And his own approbation. Which takes us to point 2: that Leo would always be condemned to look ad Ney as a friend even knowing how he felt about him (he didn’t know if Neymar could remember, but the things they had said that night in one of those parties, the ones that Leo went without having to ask for permission and with no complains of his girlfriend, were part of something that he would never forget, because of the sincerity they contained. It was a shame none of them spoke about it).

But it wouldn’t be that bad. Actually, it would be just the same as it was before. Before all that, before all the things that confused them, where it was all happiness and nobody can take that away from them. He would be back on being happy, he would call Anto and tell her to come back, invite Neymar for dinner that week with his family, and it would be cordial, normal. He wouldn’t have that regret of not having told him; because there was no chance for him to do things right, to be with him without culpabilities or mistakes. Well, there was, actually. The friendship. He knew a lot, on that seconds of epiphanies and talks with God (well, it depended if he existed or not). It would be fine. They would be back on talking about silly things all day and there wouldn’t be a bigger change.

He didn’t feel guilty because he knew Neymar was thinking the same as him. And he realized, as he yawned and finally closed his eyes to get some sleep, about the message Neymar was sending to him with the absence of it that day.

_I understand. I love you._

**Author's Note:**

> "mate" is a tradicion in Argentina, it's an infusion, idk.  
> Also I don't think they allow phones or whatsapp in planes, but it's my fanfic so in this world you can, okay?  
> Thank you for reading!


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